A wide variety of electrical connectors have been designed for terminating flat cables or circuits, such as flat flexible cables, flexible printed circuits or the like. A typical connector for flat circuits includes a dielectric housing molded of plastic material, for instance. The housing has an elongated opening or slot for receiving an end of the flat circuit which has generally parallel, laterally spaced conductors exposed across the end. A plurality of terminals are mounted in the housing and are spaced laterally along the slot, with contact portions of the terminals engageable with the laterally spaced conductors of the flat circuit. An actuator often is movably mounted on the housing for movement between a first position whereat the flat circuit is freely insertable into the slot and a second position whereat the actuator clamps the circuit in the housing and biases the circuit against the contact portions of the terminals.
Examples of such flat circuit connectors are shown in Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2002-134194; No. 2002-329536; and No. 2003-45526.
The contact portions of the terminals in such flat circuit connectors are spaced inwardly of the inlet to the elongated opening or slot in the housing for receiving the end of the flat circuit. Heretofore, most such flat circuit connectors originally created substantial resistance to insertion of the circuit into the opening and into engagement with the contact portions of the terminals. In fact, some of the contacts on the flat circuit often were deformed or damaged.
Consequently, flat circuit connectors have been designed so that the opening in the connector housing, including the interior area at the contact portions of the terminals, is wider than the thickness of the flat circuit. Therefore, the flat circuit can be inserted into the opening with no substantial resistance forces (commonly called “zero insertion force” or “ZIF”). This permits the flat circuit to be inserted with ease and prevents deformation or damage to either the contacts on the flat circuit or the contact portions of the connector terminals.
Unfortunately, such zero insertion force connectors often are too loose or free during insertion of the flat circuit. The circuit cannot be tentatively held in position, prior to final clamping, to provide for correct reinsertion or readjustment of the circuit prior to its final clamped and terminated condition. The present invention is directed to solving these problems by providing a flat circuit connector having an actuator which not only is movable between a first position allowing free insertion of the flat circuit and a second position clamping the circuit in terminated position, but the actuator is movable to an intermediate position facilitating tentative holding of the flat circuit in stable condition while allowing readjustment thereof.